Bo Burnham

Burnham was born on August 21, 1990, in Hamilton, Massachusetts, the youngest of three children of Scott Burnham, a construction company owner, and Patricia, a hospice nurse whose work was shadowed in a 2014 episode of This American Life.[10][1][11][12] In 2008, he graduated from St. John's Preparatory School in Danvers, Massachusetts, where he was on the honor roll and involved in theatre and the campus ministry program.[1][11] He was admitted to New York University's Tisch School of the Arts to study experimental theatre,[13] but instead deferred his admission for a year to pursue a career in comedy.[14]

Burnham performing at The Improv in September 2008

In 2006, Burnham videotaped himself performing two songs and posted them on YouTube to share with his family.[15] They quickly became popular through YouTube, Break.com, and other sites.[1]

Accompanying himself on guitar or digital piano, Burnham continued to release self-described "pubescent musical comedy"[15] songs and videos online as his audience grew. Described in The Boston Globe as "simultaneously wholesome and disturbing, intimate in a folksy-creepy sort of way", Burnham wrote and released songs about white supremacy, Helen Keller's disabilities, homosexuality, and more.[1] All of Burnham's home-released videos were self-recorded in and around his family's home in Hamilton, Massachusetts, most in his bedroom,[1][11] and had an intentional "do-it-yourself [feel], almost like voyeurism".[16]

Burnham's music and performances tackle such subjects as race, gender, human sexuality, sex, and religion.[17] Burnham describes his on-stage persona as a "more arrogant, stuck-up version [of] himself".[18] When speaking with The Detroit News about his rapping, he expressed his intent to honor and respect the perspective and culture of hip-hop music.[3]

Burnham recorded a performance in London for Comedy Central's The World Stands Up in January 2008 (aired June 30, 2008),[1][19] and signed a four-record deal with Comedy Central Records.[20] Comedy Central Records released Burnham's first EP, the six-song Bo fo Sho, as an online release-only album on June 17, 2008.[14][15] Burnham's first full album, the self-titled Bo Burnham, was released on March 10, 2009.[21]

Burnham has performed his music in the United States, including Cobb's Comedy Club, YouTube Live in San Francisco,[22] and Caroline's Comedy Club in New York City,[14] and internationally in London and Montreal. In August 2010, Burnham was nominated for "Best Comedy Show" at the 2010 Edinburgh Comedy Awards after his inaugural performance (of Bo Burnham: Words, Words, Words).[23] He instead received the "Panel Prize", a £5,000 prize for "the show or act who has most captured the comedy spirit of the 2010 Fringe".[24][25]

Burnham's first experience with controversy regarding his music came on March 3, 2009, when fifteen Westminster College students (members of the campus' Gay-Straight Alliance, Black Students Association, International Club, and Cultural Diversity Organization) protested his concert there that evening. Of the controversy, he said, "It's so ironic because gay bashers were the ones labeling me in high school ... I try and write satire that's well-intentioned. But those intentions have to be hidden. It can't be completely clear and that's what makes it comedy." Despite the college's admission that they had booked Burnham while ignorant of his show's material, dean of students John Comerford praised the opportunities for discourse the controversy brought the school.[17][26]

On May 21, 2010, Burnham taped his first one-hour stand-up special, entitled Words Words Words, for Comedy Central from the House of Blues in Boston as part of the network's new "House of Comedy" series of stand-up specials; it aired on Comedy Central on October 16, 2010. It was released on October 18, 2010. Burnham's second special, titled what., was released on both Netflix and YouTube on December 17, 2013.[27] Burnham's latest special, Make Happy, was produced by Netflix and released on June 3, 2016.[28]

Film

Burnham performing in Pittsburgh in April 2012

While performing at the Montreal Just for Laughs festival in 2008,[14] Burnham met with director and producer Judd Apatow. That September, Burnham negotiated with Universal Pictures to write and create the music for an Apatow-produced comedy film which he describes as the "anti-High School Musical",[11][29] although Burnham insists the script is not a parody of the Disney musicals, but an attempt to emulate the high school he attended. Hoping to star in the film he was writing, Burnham told Wired magazine that he named the star "Bo" in a "not-so-subtle hint [he] want[s] to be in it".[30] In a March 2009 interview with Boston's Weekly Dig, Burnham elaborated on his work with the film. When he is not performing, Burnham spends eight hours a day writing the music, and his nights writing the script, of which he has finished the first draft.[31] Co-writing the screenplay with Burnham was his high school friend Luke Liacos.[32] In an October 2010 interview with MTV, Burnham admitted that he did not know anything about the future of the project, and that it was all effectively up in the air as far as he knew.[33] In May 2009, viral marketing began appearing for Funny People, in which Burnham stars in an NBC sitcom called Yo Teach! In the promo, Burnham stars opposite Jason Schwartzman, as a student in the latter's English class.[34]

Burnham wrote and directed his first feature film, Eighth Grade, which was produced and distributed by A24 and premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in January 2018.[35] The film has been universally acclaimed by critics: it garnered a 99% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes based on 283 ratings,[36] and holds an average rating of 90 out of 100 on Metacritic.[37]

At the 2010 Edinburgh Festival Fringe, he was nominated for the main Edinburgh Comedy Award and won both the Edinburgh Comedy Awards' panel prize and the Malcolm Hardee "Act Most Likely to Make a Million Quid" Award.[41] Additionally, Burnham's film career has received the following accolades and nominations:

Burnham has been in a relationship with filmmaker Lorene Scafaria since around 2013. They live together in Los Angeles.[48]

Burnham has stated that his influences include Steve Martin, Hans Teeuwen, George Carlin, Mitch Hedberg, Anthony Jeselnik, Tim Minchin, Demetri Martin and Flight of the Conchords.[49][50]

• Egghead: Or, You Can't Survive on Ideas Alone (2013)[76][77]

• Official website
• Bo Burnham at Comedy Central
• Bo Burnham on IMDb